Dust Bunny (or Fish bunny depending on how you look at it)

Ok, honestly, this pattern was kind of dumb.  I thought, "Oh! I'll just whip this up really quick. No problem. One hour, tops!" Nope, unfinished bunny parts rolled around in my bag for weeks, and I refused to sew the damn thing together.  I was mostly unmotivated by the fact that I thought it was ugly.  I don't even know what possessed me to make it in the first place.  It looks like a fish the way its paws stick out to the side!

This is another Voodoo Maggie pattern.  People probably generally enjoy the simplicity of the pattern, so it's probably not the pattern's fault.  It's really probably my fault for picking such a dull brown.


See how much I disliked this? I couldn't even bother to take a clear picture..

Cotton Fruit Coasters

When these popped up on Craftgawker, I loved it!  We stayed with some relatives on our state national parks trip, so I thought these would make the perfect host/hostess gifts!

I used cotton yarn instead of acrylic as noted in the original pattern since cotton is much more absorbent for sweaty drinks.  (Except for the pink of the watermelon since I didn't have any pink cotton yarn. And I regretted it greatly because I don't like the texture)

Get the free pattern over at Repeat Crafter Me!

A few notes on the patterns:

For the pear and apple, I added a pattern of [inc, 1 sc] around the circular part of the green edge so that the coaster would stay flatter.

For the orange and lemon, I actually embroidered lazy daisy-type chain stitches instead of doing surface slip stitching.



Aren't these great little favors? And super quick to whip up!



I find that the patterns really lend themselves to variation fairly well although these several fruits are really the most recognizable. 

Variations!:
-pink grapefruit from the lemon pattern (pink inside, yellow rind)
-kiwi with slight modifications to the lime pattern (green inside, brown outside, dark brown seeds)
-avocado (pear pattern, green inside, dark brown outside, light brown pit)

I think it could also be really cute to do a hamburger and make all the parts and stack 'em up with a little toothpick!

I think I'll make these variations (I've already mostly made the kiwi) for the next time I need little gifts.

Well do ya.. punk

Honestly, I've never watched this movie, and I feel that I should (Honestly, I also do not actually know the name of this movie...The Godfather? Is that right?).  Then I would understand what this is about.  Right now, I can only appreciate this as a really good piece of graffiti.  Just look at all those cut outs!

You know how some people consider themselves movie buffs?  I guess you could call me a movie un-buff?  I have never seen most of the classics or really any movies that were in vogue when I was growing up.  I mean, I just saw The Sound of Music a couple of months ago, on VHS!

April Showers Bring May Flowers

I love these big fluffy flowers. I'm not actually sure what kinds they are, fuschias? Camellias?  No thanks to my parents' black thumbs, these few bushes have managed to survive in their backyard.  I thought that they might be better admired inside the house, so I plucked a few blooms and put them into a vase.





I love the bright blue marbles against the soft colors of the flowers.



So fluffy and pastel and feathery, ahh..



I love that color splash effect, so pretty!

Haha, funny story: when my parents came home my mom asked who had brought over the flowers, and when I told them I just picked some flowers from the backyard, my dad asked when I learned flower arranging.

I do actually have a quick tip for flower arranging; use a rubber band to secure the stems after arranging the flowers in your hand.  It'll keep the flowers from settling out of the bouquet when you set them into the vase.

The Cuddliest Viking

This is about the unrelenting brutality of harvesting carrots..*

Actually, if you haven't heard, today's the day that the Pintester Movement reveals all the awesome crafts that people have been working on since Sonja revealed the challenge a week and a half ago.  See everyone's efforts over at the Pintester!

I'm afraid that there is no source tutorial for this as it first turned up on Reddit and has been floating around Pinterest since then.  As it is, I managed to wing it myself as well.

I've been wanting to make this for forever, but I've always held off because (a) I probably don't need a viking hat with a beard (b) knotting all those individual strands of hair is a royal pain in the ass (c) if people make requests for these, they never pay enough, and finally, (d) I've never really found a good yarn to use for the beard that won't scratch your face.  Well, regarding (d), let's say I've never found a good cheap yarn to use.

I used some Red Heart Super Saver for the hat portion, but more importantly, I used Red Heart With Love for the beard.  It's one of their newer products, some kind of premium acrylic that comes out really soft.


Apologies for the horrible picture, it's apparently very difficult for me to take a self-timer picture.

I tried to make my most fearsome barbarian face, did it work?  Hey, at least it's better than the weird pirate face I made in every single other picture, haha.

I kind of wish I had a cool morningstar or sword or something to wield in this picture.  Oh and please ignore my silly out-of-character animal print t-shirt.  I didn't have anything appropriately Viking to wear.

So that's it.  That's my thick and luscious beards that two dwarves would be proud of.  Now, should I just wear it in public randomly and freak people out?

*Also, an appropriately timed Viking reference in Questionable Content.


Anyone else want to join in on the crafting fun? It's awfully satisfying to finish a project that you've been wanting to make!  Post a comment if you finish a craft, I'd love to see!

Apple Pull Apart Bread

This is a great apple pie alternative.  Sometimes I feel like having delicious cinnamon bun-type bread desserts rather than flaky pie crust.  We used this recipe from Baked by Rachel since we actually were looking for something besides pie to make with all of our apples.



I'm still trying out compressed photos, and so far I'm only seeing real quality loss in heavily shadowed areas, so I think I will probably stick with the smaller picture files.  Hopefully, this will make the blog much faster to load.

Pretty Macarons

You know, I feel like I'm kind of a slacker when it comes to trying out trends. I forget, but Malcolm Gladwell outlined in The Tipping Point the cycle of how people join trends.  There are the people who start the trend, the early joiners who popularize the trend, then basically the rest of the bandwagon.  I'm pretty much always in the bandwagon, at least in relation to the rest of the internet community.  Maybe I'm still in the early wave of trend setters when it comes to the general population, though.

Anyways, the point of all that was that I got some macarons.  Macarons are the delightful chewy little French confections and macaroons are crunchy coconutty lumps.  Know the difference!

I was fairly reluctant to jump on this particular bandwagon since I can't really stomach the $2 a piece (or greater!) price tag for ONE. Yes, one cookie.  This is like the gourmet cupcake thing all over again, right?  Anyways, my mom bought these two for me at a shop in Irvine/Diamond Jamboree I think.

The teal one is Passionfruit and the orange one is mango.  Oh, be still my heart.  Teal and lilikoi together? Two of my favorite things.

I thought they were really tasty, and I'm kind of excited to hone my baking skills so that I can try to make my own at home.





By the way, I'm trying to decide if I can use compressed jpeg images here on the blog to speed up the loading of each page.  Can you tell which photo is 300KB and which is 9.5MB?  I don't think that I can see a difference in quality. :)